Ground Combat Balance - V21 Experimental 5

[KateMicucci]

to be honest, I'd rather reduce the cost of the scatter laser or nerf the rocket launcher than up the ammo capacity. The low ammo capacity means you actually have to think when you use the gun, even if it is very powerful.

It doesn't make me think when I use the gun as much as it makes me think, WHY should I use the gun?

The rocket launcher is already a niche weapon that isn't in need of a nerf. Is there a serious problem of players using nothing but rockets launchers? Is it likely that players are going to arm their squads with nothing but scatter lasers if the ammo capacity is increased? I don't think so.

The player is expected to make a lot of sacrifices to bring heavy weapons into battle and has to work hard to use them properly. They require a soldier with high Str who could otherwise be hauling grenades or extra shields. They need to take up one of the few spaces on the battlefield that is both in strong cover and have good field of view. They need to be scouted for so that they don't trigger reaction fire. They need to be protected while they get in position. Heavy weapons are a pain. If those weapons also do a lot of damage, good! They better.

3 shots instead of 2 would hardly make the scatter laser too powerful.

[mrxny]

There is a difference between an opinion and an insult. I guarantee you that if you tell anyone that their years of hard work deserves to go in the garbage (rightly or wrongly) you aren't going to have much luck getting them to listen to you. Not to mention this is an experimental build and many of the changes may not make into the release version. At least he is willing to listen to the opinion of the community regarding proposed changes. That is not true of many other developers. Several of my suggestions have made it into the game and well as those of many others.

I never said the Whole game was garbage, just the recent Tu % change.

What world do you live in that everyone says please and thank you ?

We all paid money - So - when a movie sucks -people don't bash it? Grow up and take Criticism like a MAN.

- You screw up, expect the heat

I'll sip my cup o Tea, with an extended pinky before my next post

Edited February 26, 2014 by mrxny

[StellarRat]

I never said the Whole game was garbage, just the recent Tu % change.

What world do you live in that everyone says please and thank you ?

We all paid money - So - when a movie sucks -people don't bash it? Grow up and take Criticism like a MAN.

- You screw up, expect the heat

I'll sip my cup o Tea, with an extended pinky before my next post

You didn't say just the TU % change did you though? You said, Xenonauts ------> Recycling Bin. And yes, in my world, when we are working on something collaboratively we generally don't tell each other all our work needs to go in the trash. We make suggestions for improvements or say the solution doesn't work. If the person is incapable of improving their work then eventually they'll be let go. If you're posting here the assumption is that you are interested in contributing to the development of the game essentially. I don't agree with the % thing either, but I'm not going to say it the way you did. Edited February 27, 2014 by StellarRat

[Asmodean]

The game is still in beta and huge changes like this to test alternative systems are quite welcome to me.

I would rather test this system and find out it doesn't work as well as another alternative than stick with the current one just for the sake of it.

That is after all what the experimental branch is for, experimenting.

I imagine a line or two of code and a copy/paste of the old xml file will be all that is required to change this back if required so I am quite willing to spend a bit of time testing it.

I also stand by my own posts.

This system has its merits and deserves testing.

To throw it out without testing it because one or two people don't like the idea behind it is foolish.

Test it and provide useful feedback in a positive manner, even when the feedback is negative, and I am sure Chris will take into account those posts.

Your opening post, that you still stand by, calling decisions retarded and asking 'Seriously, who thought this was a good idea' comes across as negative and whiney.

That is less likely to find a sympathetic ear.

However, I think it is a good change. Over the past few builds there have been a lot of people complaining about the late game, where they are fighting aliens with high TUs (Sebby elites used to have 120TU, Caesan elites used to have 100TU etc) because those aliens are capable of firing five or six shots a turn at you. This makes them extremely dangerous, but also boring to watch them spam shots.

The TU level of high-end aliens has been nerfed somewhat, but the point is still valid. A Xenonaut or alien who has 100 TU is more than twice as good as a 50 TU unit with the same stats, because they can move so far and fire so many shots (more than twice as good because they do one or the other or even combine both depending on the situation, giving them more versatility).

Once you factor in the fact that high-level soldiers have better stats across the board, they are ludicrously overpowered compared to standard units. A unit with 100 TU and 100 Accuracy has 400% the combat effectiveness of one with 50 TU and 50 Acc based just on those two stats.

Under the new system, high-TU soldiers are more mobile than their low-TU counterparts. If a 40 TU and a 80 TU unit spend half their TU shooting (producing the same number of shots), the 80 TU soldier can move an extra six tiles than the lower-TU unit. If they spent no TU shooting, it can move an extra twelve tiles....or spend the extra TU shuffling stuff in their inventory, or reloading or whatever.

TU now represents movement ability, rather than being a super-mega-death stat. If you liked it the previous way, it's understandable - you probably realised just how good high-TU soldiers were, then. But they were too good, and people's experiences fighting the end-game aliens that had the same advantage seems to reinforce this. The OG did it the % way and it has some obvious advantages.

There are probably unintended consequences from this change - I hadn't considered the effect it would have on the weight formula, for example. I'm considering leaving it as is, with heavy armoured soldiers moving more slowly but their guns not firing less bullets.

THANK YOU DEVELOPERS for using the experimental build to experiment. Good or Bad I hope you learn something from this and all the other builds to continue to improve the game! Maybe it will be TUs as a % maybe you will discover a brand new idea. But the only way to surely fail is to not try.

On to my opinions

TUs as a %. I really did not like it at first, the main reason is I feel like my soldiers progress is too slowly now. BUT the points made on late game alien and soldier veterans is a very good one! Especially if you lose some veterans in the late game. So now I am thinking TUs as a % in combination with the other changes to late game may be a better direction than before. I am not ready to say this is the perfect solution but I can see the logic and it does make sense.

It might be worth looking for some other small ways to reward soldier progression. Maybe some extra medals... maybe with some interesting (but small) bonuses besides just bravery? It would give me something else to get excited about in regards to soldier progression other than the old TUs.

MG...

Overall I like it. It is fun to spray an area with 10 bullets with 7% accuracy. Great at suppressing a group, and sometimes I get lucky and mow someone down too, or blow out a cover.

I am not sure super small ammo capacities is a good idea though. I already hardly get to fire the thing because I can only move 1 tile (including some turning) and still fire it. So taking a turn to reload and the MGunner is just going to be left behind. On the other hand he has never kept up enough to fire more than twice anyways so far.

On the other hand a slight decrease in TU% for MG would be nice. I am finding I generally don't have patience to wait for the MGunner to move into place and get his TUs back.

[GTAjedi]

I just registered to say I don't like this for the reasons already stated. A guy with 2x TU should be able to do 2x actions, not just move a little more. Just doesn't seem right.

[mrxny]

I just registered to say I don't like this for the reasons already stated. A guy with 2x TU should be able to do 2x actions, not just move a little more. Just doesn't seem right.

Right on -Developers- Just admit you want the game to be "1 shot per turn"

Edited February 27, 2014 by mrxny

[Pimgd]

Right on - Just admit you want the game to be "1 shot per turn"

Reread his post and try again.

[Asmodean]

On a mission a soldier was injured needing 7 days recovery.

I finished said mission.

Then I flew to base and immediately left again for a new landed UFO taking the injured soldier with me.

Now injured soldier started the combat with 49/47 HPS as in 49 of 47 which seems backwards... except neither of those are my actual full health HPS. So weird little bug of some sort.

[Gauddlike]

Like the fact that heavily loaded soldiers can still fire, that it's now impossible for any soldier to ever fire two bursts from an AR no matter how good they are, etc...

If I made you carry heavy stones in your pockets until you had to walk slowly would that prevent you from firing the gun in your hand at the enemy trying to kill you?

Would it force you to only pull the trigger every 2 seconds instead of every second or would it have no real effect?

Why should wearing heavy armour prevent the soldiers gun from working at all?

I can understand it making it difficult for them to walk as fast as a less loaded down person, which is what the new system represents.

The difference is that the overloaded soldier would be less able to move and fire in the same turn than a less overloaded soldier.

The reason the soldiers cannot fire two bursts is because burst fire is currently balanced to be an extremely high AP cost shot.

It is set to 80% which I believe is the equivalent of around 49 AP under the old system.

With that setting only the ultimate super soldiers would have been able to fire twice anyway.

I don't think the system is as bad as some are making out but I do believe it needs some balancing.

I also don't think this new system is perfect any more than the old one was.

The LMG has 10 round bursts and 50 round magazines.

That means you will only need to reload every sixth turn.

I haven't tried the later ones but I would prefer to stick to the same sort of time scale.

Especially as the later battles tend to last longer so a shorter time between reloads would be far more noticeable.

[StellarRat]

If I made you carry heavy stones in your pockets until you had to walk slowly would that prevent you from firing the gun in your hand at the enemy trying to kill you?

I can sort of buy this one, but nonetheless, I don't like the implementation. There are other ways to accomplish the same thing that are more intuitive. Realistically, increasing movement speed as much as a Xenonauts does is odd in general. One month I can run the 100 meters in 12 seconds and next month I've shaved 2 seconds off my time? No way. But, I can easily see someone becoming significantly quicker in spotting and engaging targets accurately with practice i.e. more shooting per round. With experience a Xenonaut should become much better at guessing where an enemy is and identifying the whether or not it's an enemy then shooting. What we have here is exact opposite.

The LMG has 10 round bursts and 50 round magazines.

That means you will only need to reload every sixth turn.

I meant LMG TYPE weapons, Scatter Laser, etc... yes the ballistic LMG isn't really a problem other then the nerfing of damage and high TU costs to fire now. The problem is that that makes the "upgrade" the high level weapons even less of an "upgrade". I'd seriously have to think about whether the Scatter Laser is even worth the trouble now. I still stand by my comments that it makes the distinction between the heavy weapon types even more murky. Edited February 27, 2014 by StellarRat

[victorix58]

Chris,

Meaning no offense, I would like to add my voice to those who do not like the TU change.

Here's why: (1) I liked getting soldiers who were overpowered in TUs; (2) I liked knowing how many shots I could fire/I liked keeping track of it without the TU reserve button; (3) I liked feeling the sense of advancement as a high TU soldier could fire even more shots and kick ass; (4) if I found late game aliens to be overpowered because of TUs, I would simply nerf the TUs of the aliens.

If you leave it in, please leave that 'switch' in as an option so we can manually change it back. At this point, the TU change is acting as a deterrent from me playing the game.

[legit1337]

If I made you carry heavy stones in your pockets until you had to walk slowly would that prevent you from firing the gun in your hand at the enemy trying to kill you?

Would it force you to only pull the trigger every 2 seconds instead of every second or would it have no real effect?

Why should wearing heavy armour prevent the soldiers gun from working at all?

I can understand it making it difficult for them to walk as fast as a less loaded down person, which is what the new system represents.

No but wearing a huge, heavy suit of armor would definitely impair my aim and combat abilities. Mobility is extremely important in firefights, more than most people realize. When I was deployed, some of the guys in my unit wouldn't even wear their vests if it was a low enough intensity skirmish because it hampered their ability to move around quickly and respond to threats.

The higher tier LMGs have 20 bullets per magazine.

I think this sums up my reaction to reading the patch notes...

Edited February 27, 2014 by legit1337

[DNK]

1. Put improvement in TU's and firing accuracy on a bell curve. So, new soldiers improve rapidly at first then the increase slows down very quickly when they become "veterans". The formula for this is very simple. Amount of increase = Desired Midpoint/Current Rating

This is a great idea. It feels more realistic, balances the game out more, and still allows for progression.

2. Simply cap TUs and max. accuracy at 80 or whatever number seems right.

This, really. I think it was about that in TOG, and that felt right. Doesn't make sense that you have veterans being 100% better/faster/stronger/resilienter/accurater than rooks.

3. Put TUs and/or accuracy increase on a non-linear slope. So, say it takes two combat events to move up one TU, the next one would take four, the next one eight, etc... This means that it would be impossible to have super soldiers during the time span of the game. This type of system has been used successfullly for many years in many role playing games, including Dungeons and Dragons.

Also a good idea.

I also liked my ideas

Discount the opinions of the people that paid you money...

Criticism can always be harsher.

You could just be polite and nice. Yes, they 'owe' you a finished game along the lines of what was promised. They don't owe you the specific game you personally want configured exactly to your taste. And the rather small amount of money you sent them does not make them your bitch nor give you the right to treat them impolitely. Humans aren't sold so cheaply nowadays...

Pardonnez mon Francais.

[Dead Dread]

MG's weren't changed because they were insufficiently powerful, they were changed because they were boring. A ten round burst is much more fun and feels more satisfying than a five round burst, but the small ammo count and expensive reload time stops them being OP and makes them more challenging to use (particularly when you get Predators). The purpose here is to produce an interesting weapon in gameplay terms that scales through all tech levels rather than an accurate simulation of a modern machinegun.

^ <3 The new MGs!!!

Dislike the TU change as im now spending MUCH longer trying to figure out if i can move somewhere and have enough TUs left over to fire due to every soldier having different values... & yes i know the slider to reserve is there but still my poor brain cant cope ;-P I dont see myself getting use to it as the values will continually change throughout the game meaning its an added complicated slowdown in my tactical thinking as opposed to memorising a few values (40 for burst)

TBH im not sure what the fix is... Yes TU was godly before... I'll have to dwell on this one further.

[EDIT] Well i do have this idea, seperate TU into Movement and Action stats... tho that could get real ugly codewise at this point. Idea being that you can use action stats to move but cannot use movement stats to do stuff like fire a gun multiple times etc.

Edited February 27, 2014 by Dead Dread

[Moonie]

I think Chris is just trying out ridiculous stuff on us like the alien super shot, to find the border line between challenge and enjoyment. It will get there in the end.

[Amaror]

I really don't like the % change either.

I really hope your reconsidering this.

Having my veterans be just as good as rookies doesn't feel right. This was one great thing about xenonauts. Seeing your soldiers level up and become more and more powerfull. Now they can only more a little farther, maybe hit an alien a bit better and that's it.

Veterans SHOULD be considerably better. Of course it needs balancing, but it worked so well in the last version. At least in my opinion.

I liked the post of stellarrat about other ways of fixing supersoldiers and i 100% aggree with them. In this version levelling up doesn't feel rewarding at all and it really really should.

[Dead Dread]

2. Simply cap TUs and max. accuracy at 80 or whatever number seems right.

^ This

[Gauddlike]

I can sort of buy this one, but nonetheless, I don't like the implementation. There are other ways to accomplish the same thing that are more intuitive. Realistically, increasing movement speed as much as a Xenonauts does is odd in general. One month I can run the 100 meters in 12 seconds and next month I've shaved 2 seconds off my time? No way. But, I can easily see someone becoming significantly quicker in spotting and engaging targets accurately with practice i.e. more shooting per round. With experience a Xenonaut should become much better at guessing where an enemy is and identifying the whether or not it's an enemy then shooting. What we have here is exact opposite.

I meant LMG TYPE weapons, Scatter Laser, etc... yes the ballistic LMG isn't really a problem other then the nerfing of damage and high TU costs to fire now. The problem is that that makes the "upgrade" the high level weapons even less of an "upgrade". I'd seriously have to think about whether the Scatter Laser is even worth the trouble now. I still stand by my comments that it makes the distinction between the heavy weapon types even more murky.

I agree completely on the LMG type weapons and I think more balancing is definitely required to find the sweet spot.

Hopefully some actual game play feedback will be forthcoming.

On your first points I have to disagree with your conclusion.

What you are describing there is what the current situation represents as your desired outcome but then reversing how it actually works so it appears not to meet those outcomes.

Not saying you are misrepresenting it, I just reckon we are thinking about it from different angles.

I disagree that acquiring your target quicker and firing should be represented by more shots fired per round.

That is represented in the new system by the ability to do more in the same turn as well as shooting.

All soldiers can acquire a target, aim at it and fire the same number of shots.

The difference is that the veterans will be more likely to hit, able to do more other actions as well as firing a shot, or be able to perform the same number of other actions but use a higher aim tier to reflect how much more experienced they are.

Think of the turn as a whole.

A rookie takes a second or two to aim at his target, fires off his shot and then takes a couple of steps forward towards cover.

In the same time period a veteran raises his rifle, fires at the target, but because he is more experienced he has more time remaining so he can move further than the rookie.

That is how the current system works, it is also pretty much how the old system worked.

The major difference is that damage is more uniform under the proposed system, the veteran is just better at applying that damage due to accuracy.

In the old system not only were they better at applying damage they also had more damage at their disposal.

Using percentages for AP costs allows the damage output of weapons to be uniform.

You know a rifle with 33% AP cost will fire at most 3 shots a turn for a maximum total damage of 3x20 per tun.

Under the old system that same rifle with 20 AP cost could fire 3 times for a rookie, 4 times for a veteran, and 5 times for a maxed out super soldier.

Add to that the fact that the rookie would also likely miss with more of those shots.

Using percentages the rookie will still likely miss more so the veteran soldiers have higher potential damage output, they just don't get rewarded twice by being given more shots to fire plus a higher accuracy to make more of them hit.

Under this system a rookie is still not the best option to take along but they should be a bit less useless.

I don't know if either of the systems is particularly realistic.

As you say improving the sprinting speed of a professional soldier by 100% is unlikely but then I find improving the firing time of a professional soldier by 50% to 100% to also be unlikely.

Fortunately this is a game so doesn't really need to follow a realistic education and training system.

[TrashMan]

Dislike the TU change as im now spending MUCH longer trying to figure out if i can move somewhere and have enough TUs left over to fire due to every soldier having different values... & yes i know the slider to reserve is there but still my poor brain cant cope ;-P I dont see myself getting use to it as the values will continually change throughout the game meaning its an added complicated slowdown in my tactical thinking as opposed to memorising a few values (40 for burst)

Unless I'm mistaken, various weapons will ALWAYS take the exact same percentage of the TU bar.

Therefore, simply looking at the bar should be enough to guesstimate.

Alternatively, you can add "notches" to the TU bar that will mark TU's needed for a shot.

[Gauddlike]

I almost always have AP reserve turned on when I am moving around so I know exactly how far I can move while still having time to fire, the brightly coloured line tells me that.

[TrashMan]

Alternative solution - have rookies start with a much higher TU stat, so difference between rookie and veteran in that aspect is low.

[TrashMan]

1) movement matters. If a veteran can move farther than a rookie, then it is NOT irrelevant.

Making it to cover, or being able to move a few more squares closer before shooting can make a huge difference.

So "overloading" your soldiers is not a recommended tactic. Shooting costs are % based. Movement is not.

2) MG ammo. I love realism. But, the hit ratio for everyone involved should be a LOT lower (thus reloading also more frequent) if you want to go that route. Meaning a LOT longer battles. A lot more drag. In a turn based game with lots of enemies and slow turn processing? Murder.

I tried it. It isn't much fun.

So ammo capacity is lowered to compensate and to make ammo more relevant.

However, I demand that aliens have to reload too.

[Chris]

I am still considering the TU %. I must admit I'm surprised by the negative reactions to it - I thought it was a good change.

In terms of the arguments against, I can firstly see the argument that it makes moving and shooting more of a chore because the shot costs change on a per-soldier basis. You can use the reserve mode to make this easier, but it's still not as simple as remembering to save 20 TU or 40 TU (or whatever).

I can also see the argument that it reduces the progression available to your soldiers, with high-end soldiers feeling less powerful.

In terms of mitigation, we can probably work out something to fix the first issue. Aaron's suggested that perhaps character paths would have little labels on them that would show you how far you can move before you no longer have the TU required for each type of shot.

The second issue is a bit more thorny because the objection is the exact issue the change was intended to fix: high-TU units are extremely powerful. Making them less powerful will naturally give the players less progression, but also makes the game more balanced at end-game level.

TU is currently a super-stat that we have to treat differently from other stats - e.g. it has a lower starting range for new soldiers, as soldiers with low TU are useless and high TU are amazing. In my view, it's overpowered. As a developer, it's difficult to filter out whether objections are primarily because your change has nerfed a user's favourite toy, or because of genuine design issues.

I need to think about this one some more; I'll probably open a separate thread on the matter once I've collected my thoughts.

[Chris]

@Mrxny - I can't be bothered to have a debate with you on the subject, but generally people comment on this forum for two reasons. The first is so their opinions on the game can be considered by the development team and perhaps have the game changed more to their preferences. The second is to throw insults at us / other forum users.

If you want to do the former, the best way to do it is to voice your positive or negative opinions politely. It's fine to be negative about the game, but you're saying ridiculous things like the entire game is garbage because of % TU costs. If you genuinely believe that then you're not the sort of person who's going to be able to contribute to the discussion, and if you don't believe it then why bother posting it? It just means you're not going to get your point across. Just say you think the % TU costs is a bad idea like everyone else who disagrees has.

I'm not saying this because I'm afraid of harsh criticism, I'm saying it because I'm assuming you're not actually trying to troll us and don't realise that the way you're posting is counter-productive and turns developers off from agreeing with whatever you're trying to say. This isn't about being a "man", it's about trying to make a game we all want to play.

[vaultdweller]

What world do you live in that everyone says please and thank you ?

The world I live in is one where posts such as yours have effectively zero chance of persuading anyone of anything. It is the world that the rest of us live in. It's also the world you live in, whether you've learned this yet or not.

If you don't want to be ignored, don't rant in a way that will make absolutely every observer ignore you.